Revolt of the Strays
by Darkrealmist v.2
Summary: Nicol Bolas' Dreadhorde marches on Ravnica, but Janoc, a tinker making a modest living on Tin Street, uncovers a perhaps more sinister plot.


Revolt of the Strays

Author's Note: Enjoy the story and R&R.

Disclaimer: I do not own anything related to or of _Magic: The Gathering_.

Summary:

Nicol Bolas' Dreadhorde marches on Ravnica, but Janoc, a tinker making a modest living on Tin Street, uncovers a perhaps more sinister plot.

* * *

Ravnica burned in anarchy. Spires aflame. Citizens screaming. Strangely attired visitors assassinated in broad daylight by even stranger undead soldiers unlike any Golgari shamblers Janoc had ever encountered. Plated in a blue, metallic mineral and bronze mail, which attracted Janoc's eye. Wispy trails of energy flew round the city's ruined structures, vacuumed toward the dark sun perched above the imperious citadel that appeared over the rubble where the Chamber of the Guildpact last stood.

None Janoc spoke to knew whence the fatigueless army came. Another plane of reality beyond the stars, rumour held. An unthinkable concept. A shimmer of impossibility. Whoever these invaders were, they represented Ravnica's hour of devastation, and conducted their mission with cold, cunning efficiency.

What irony. The guilds claiming dominion over the world, often bogged down in petty, self-interested squabbles, banding together to fight a common foe.

Undoubtedly, the amassing terrors served the monstrous dragon reigning tall against the eclipsed sky, vainer and more ostentatious than the great dracowizard Niv-Mizzet himself.

A Gateless tinker by trade, Janoc wanted to contribute. He professed no official affiliation to any of the guilds, yet the crescendo of war gave him ample moment to shine. Until recent events, parents cautioned children not to get too close to Janoc, a much-scoffed-at conspiracy peddler, assembling trinkets behind the Tin Street melon carts. Now, Boros swiftblades and legionnaires poured into the Tenth District, asking him to supply weapons.

Since the killing machines arrived, Janoc suspected an eviler intellect at work. No, not the interplanar conqueror. Certainly, the marauding crops slaughtered victims mercilessly, harvesting what could only be construed as souls for their cruel master. But that was the perfect distraction.

Residents didn't notice because a death squad of magically enhanced initiates is pretty hard to ignore.

Janoc, however, did.

"There's something peculiar about the cats today."

Feline slits leered at him. Gutters, lintels, sills. Strays everywhere! Unimpressed by murder and mayhem. Measly concerns of measly folk, fleeing the scorn of a dragon-god, measlier still.

Pure violence exploded outside a precinct-dividing tollbooth. Janoc's furry, undesired sentinels licked their claws, unmoved.

Up the avenue, a battalion had constructed a blockade. Improbable the wall would endure further punishment, from the looks of it. Back a distance, a woman gestured, laggardly guiding the actions of the horde.

Outliers populated the attackers' discernibly once-human ranks. Bipedal forms incorporating animal characteristics, comparable only to experimental subjects of the Simic.

Among those creatures strutted a lone kitten, menacingly serrulate and blue like its rampaging allies.

A zombie cat? This tyrant was nothing if not outrageously self-aware in his villainy.

The witch commanding the abominations advanced her troops. They devoutly followed her orders, with the exception of the Dreadmalkin. It heard her mandate, disdainfully flicked its armoured paw, and scampered across the rooftops.

Insubordinate, it betrayed its mistress to mingle with the local alley kitties, meowing malevolent machinations in Janoc's ear.

The cats! The cats were taking over!

Ravnicans were so busy combatting the enemy on their doorstep, they dismissed the second invasion occurring right under their noses.

_I must warn them! I must warn the people!_ Janoc thought.

A wounded Ledev Guardian and his wolf staggered to Janoc's stand seeking a Wojek teardrop.

Displeased purrs incapacitated him before he could tell the elf what he'd learned.

Who'd believe him anyway?


End file.
